Bottles thrown during Malaysia Airlines press conference0:37

Frustrated relatives of Malaysia Airlines flight MH370 vent their anger at officials by throwing bottles of water during a press conference.

March 12th 2014

4 years ago

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What isn't Malaysia telling us?Source:AP

IS Malaysia laying a deliberate smokescreen?

As the world waits for answers about missing Malaysia Airlines Flight MH370, the families of its 239 lost passengers and crew are getting fed up with official furphies.

And they're not the only ones.

Vietnam has just announced it is suspending its air search for missing flight MH370 and scaling back its sea search as it waits for Malaysia to clarify the potential new direction of the multi-national hunt - not the first clash between the two countries on the issue.

Malaysian authorities have made a number of conflicting statements since Saturday, while failing to address rumours about the plane.

1. NEIGHBOURS GETTING ANNOYED

From the time flight MH370 went missing, the nations involved in its search have been out of step - in particular Malaysia and Vietnam.

Vietnam was quick to contribute its resources to the search effort and even quicker to make public each potential development. They promptly announced everything from reported radar readings to oil slick sightings and possible floating debris.

News_Image_File: Not happy ... Guo Shaochun, head of a joint working group sent by the Chinese government to be in charge of the search for the missing Malaysia Airlines plane.

Meanwhile, Malaysia has been on the back foot, hosing down each new glimmer of hope.

And when the Malaysian authorities actually announce something, they have frequently backtracked or denied it within 24 hours.

Now Vietnam is fed up and has suspended its air search and scaled back its sea search as it waits for Malaysia to clarify the potential new direction of the multi-national hunt.

And China, where two-thirds of the passengers are from, isn't happy either.

It's urged Malaysian authorities to "speed up the efforts" to find the plane. It has sent four ships, with another four on the way.

A shopping mall in Beijing suspended advertising on its large outdoor LED screen to display a search timer - an image of an aeroplane along with a digital clock marking the time since contact with the flight was lost.

News_Module: Malaysia Search Area

2. PLANE NOT MISSING, JUST DELAYED

Air traffic controllers apparently lost contact with Flight MH370 at 2.40am on March 8 but the arrivals board at Beijing airport simply said the flight was "DELAYED".

For hours relatives waiting at the destination were completely in the dark, thinking the flight was just late.

Furious family members say they found out about the disaster from the media, not Malaysia Airlines.

It wasn't until 9.05am that Malaysia Airlines issued this statement: "We deeply regret that we have lost all contacts with Flight MH370 which departed Kuala Lumpur at 12.41am earlier this morning bound for Beijing."

3. CONFLICTING REPORTS ABOUT FLIGHT PATH

Malaysia's air force chief said Wednesday authorities have not ruled out the possibility the missing airliner inexplicably changed course before losing contact, but denied reports the jet had been detected far from its planned flight path.

"The (air force) has not ruled out the possibility of an air turn-back on a reciprocal heading before the aircraft vanished from the radar," General Rodzali Daud said in a statement.

"This resulted in the search and rescue operations being widened to the vicinity of the waters (off the west coast of Malaysia)." But he denied a Malaysian media report on Tuesday that quoted him as saying that radar had last detected the plane over the Strait of Malacca off western Malaysia.

This came after Malaysian military sources apparently said radar evidence shows missing Flight MH370 was hundreds of kilometres off course and travelling in the opposite direction to its original destination.

News_Module: callenges

4. THE MISSING HOUR

Some publications initially questioned the veracity of the timeline of events. Malaysia Airlines originally said the plane took off at 12.41am Malaysian time, and at 2.40am it disappeared from radar in Subang, Kuala Lumpur.

A spokesman then confirmed the last conversation took place at 1.30am between the flight crew and air traffic control in Malaysia, but reiterated the plane did not vanish from air traffic control systems until 2.40am.

After mass confusion and many conspiracy theories sprouting from the timeline discrepancy, Malaysia Airlines updated the public record to state the last time of radar tracking at 1.22am and the last contact at 1.30am.

5. TERRORISM RUMOURS LINGERERED

Malaysian authorities activated counterterrorism units to "look at all possibilities" and maintained they were investigating two mystery men travelling on stolen passports - despite one of the men's mothers contacting authorities after he didn't arrive at his final destination.

Two passengers on the missing flight travelling on false passports became the focus of a grim investigation as aviation and security experts claimed a bomb was the most likely cause of the disaster.

After lengthy speculation about the intentions of the pair, they were last night eventually identified as asylum seekers 19-year-old Pouria Nour Mohammad Mehrdad and 29-year-old Delavar Seyedmohammaderza.

Malaysia's Inspector General of Police, Tan Sri Khalid Abu Bakar, said Mehrdad was travelling on a stolen Austrian passport and was planning to meet up with his mother in Frankfurt, where he is believed to have planned to seek asylum.

He said the young man's mother had contacted Malaysian authorities to inform them of her concern when her son didn't get in touch with her.

News_Module: Plane crash theories

6. APPEARANCE OF STOLEN PASSPORT HOLDERS

Authorities claimed the two stolen passport holders - who turned out to be Iranian asylum seekers - had been of Asian appearance.

The Malaysian Home Minister that the two men were of Asian appearance before the Director-general of Malaysia's Department of Civil aviation, Azharuddin Abdul Rahman, clarified that the two passengers were not Asian-looking.

Asked if they looked African, Mr Rahman would not comment except to point out that footballer Mario Balotelli was Italian but was not Italian-looking. He was apparently misquoted as saying the men looked like Balotelli, which added to general confusion about official explanations.

7. MYSTERY FIVE BECOME MYSTERY FOUR

Days after the flight, mystery still surrounds the identity of four passengers who failed to board the flight.

On Monday Malaysia's civil aviation chief Azharuddin Abdul Rahman told a press conference that five passengers checked in for the flight but didn't end up boarding the plane. He was quick to assure the public their baggage was removed from the plane, in accordance with strict regulations.

However, it turns out the bags never existed in the first place because the passengers never made it to the check-in desk.

We now know there were only four people - not five - who missed Flight MH370.

Malaysia Airlines released a statement overnight that quashed the civil aviation body's claim, and in the process raised a whole new series of questions over what really happened in the moments before the flight.

News_Image_File: Needle in a haystack ... a Vietnamese air force helicopter pilot shows a crew member checking a map during a search for missing Malaysia Airlines Flight MH370.

8. HOW SECURE WAS THE COCKPIT? POSSIBLY NOT VERY

The laid-back approach to security of one of the flight's copilots has also come under scrutiny after two women came forward to detail how he broke rules by inviting them into the cockpit during a flight in 2011.

Investigations into the copilot of the flight have discovered he once invited a Melbourne tourist and her friend into the cockpit where he smoked, took photos and entertained the pair during a previous international flight.

In a worrying lapse of security, it's been revealed pilot Fariq Abdul Hamid and his colleague broke Malaysia Airline rules when they invited passengers Jonti Roos and Jaan Maree to join them in the cabin for the one-hour flight from Phuket to Kuala Lumpur in 2011.

Ms Roos, who is travelling around Australia, told A Current Affair she and Ms Maree posed for pictures with the pilots, who smoked cigarettes during the midair rendezvous.

Malaysia Airlines said it was "shocked" by allegations.

"Malaysia Airlines has become aware of the allegations being made against First Officer Fariq Abdul Hamid which we take very seriously. We are shocked by these allegations," a statement by the airline said.

"We have not been able to confirm the validity of the pictures and videos of the alleged incident. As you are aware, we are in the midst of a crisis, and we do not want our attention to be diverted."

News_Image_File: Now ruled out as terrorists ... two young Iranian men who were travelling with stolen passports on missing Malaysia Arlines Flight MH370.

9. LIGHTS IN THE NIGHT SKY

While Malaysian authorities are not underf ire for this, there is ambiguity over several reports of locals claiming to have seen the lights of a low-flying aircraft in an area of the Malaysian coast, just below the Malay-Thai border.

It is this area which is now included in the widened search area.

A fishermen who was in his boat at sea says that at about 1.30am he saw the lights of a low-flying aircraft in the area of Kuala Besar.

Azid Ibrahim told The Star newspaper in Malaysia that the plane was flying so low that that the lights were "as big as coconuts".

And another man, about 30km south of Kota Baru, is reported to have seen "bright white lights" from what he thought was a fast-descending aircraft at about 1.45am on Saturday morning.

He has since reported what he saw to authorities after seeing the lights from his home that evening.

THE pilot of a Boeing 777 flying just 30 minutes ahead of the doomed Malaysia Airlines ­aircraft was the last to make contact with flight MH370.

Vietnamese air traffic control requested the pilot make contact with MH370 to relay a message to contact authorities on the ground.

The pilot, who asked to ­remain anonymous, told the New Straits Times that his aircraft, bound for Narita, Japan, was able to make contact using an emergency frequency.

"We managed to establish contact with MH370 just after 1.30am and asked them if they have transferred into Vietnamese airspace.

"The voice on the other side could have been either Captain Zaharie (Ahmad Shah, 53) or Fariq (Abdul Hamid, 27), but I was sure it was the copilot.

"There were a lot of interference … static … but I heard mumbling from the other end.

"That was the last time we heard from them.

"We lost contact."

11. DID DAMAGED WINGTIP WEAKEN PLANE?

IT has emerged that the missing Malaysia Airlines Boeing 777 was involved in a 2012 runway collision with another aircraft that left it with a broken wingtip.

Details of the incident at Shanghai's Pudong airport in August 2012 - in which its wingtip was broken when it hit the tail of another aircraft - emerged as one of several theories on the disappearance of the flight to Beijing, including the likelihood of an on-air bombing.